18 • HISTOEICAL NOTES ON BEE DISEASES. 



DziERZON, 1882. 



For many years Dzierzon and others entertained the belief that 

 there existed two forms of foul brood, a mild form and a virulent one. 

 In his ''Rational Bee Keeping," Dzierzon^ has written the following 

 concerning the kinds of foul brood. 



There is one kind that is mild and curable, and another kind malignant and incura- 

 ble; both kinds are, however, contagious. 



The curable occurs in this way: More of the larvae die still unsealed, while they are 

 still curled up at the bottom of the cell, rotting and drying up to a grey crust, that may 

 be removed with tolerable ease. The brood which does not die before sealing mostly 

 attains to perfection, and it is only exceptionally that individual foul-brood cells are 

 met with sealed. 



This is exactly reversed in the malignant kind of foul brood. In this the larvae do 

 not generally die before they have raised themselves from the bottom of the cell, have 

 been sealed and begun to change into nymphs. The rotten matter is, therefore, not 

 found on the cell floor, but on the lower cell wall; it is brownish and tough, and dries 

 up to a firm black crust, both in consequence of the heat prevailing in the hive, and 

 of a small opening bitten in the depressed cover. This matter the bees are not able 

 to remove; and when they are in some strength, they can at most get rid of it by entirely 

 biting down the tainted cells and making fresh ones. 



The description wliich Dzierzon here gives of the "mild" form of 

 foul brood applies very well to European foul brood, and his de- 

 scription of the "malignant" form applies equally well to American 

 foul brood. It is fair to suppose that he encountered both European 

 foul brood and American foul brood, but instead of recognizing them 

 as two distinct diseases, he thought them to be two forms of the same 



disease. 



Cheshire, August 1, 1884. 



The work of Cheshire on the cause of bee diseases is of much in- 

 terest and should be somewhat carefully considered, inasmuch as it 

 has directly and indirectly caused much confusion in the minds of 

 bee keepers concerning the nature, cause, and treatment of foul 

 brood. 



The first paper ^ by liim to be considered was the outgrowth of an 

 invitation by a committee of the British Bee Keepers' Association 

 about the last of May, 1884, to give an address before the association 

 on foul brood. A paper of considerable length was prepared and 

 was read before that body of bee keepers on July 25, 1884. In this 

 address the subject of foul brood was taken up under three separate 

 headings: (1) "The nature of foul brood as a germ disease;" (2) 

 "The means of the propagation of the disease;" (3) "The method of 



1 Dzierzon, Johannes, 1882. Dzierzon 's Rational Bee Keeping; or the theory and practice of Dr. Dzier- 

 zon. Translated from the latest German edition by H. Dicck and S. Stutterd. Edited and revised by 

 Charles Nash Abbott, London. Pp. xvi+S.'jO. 



* Cheshire, Frank R., August 1,1884. Foul brood (not Micrococcus, but Bacillus), themeans of its prop- 

 agation and the method of its cure. British Bee Journal, Vol. XII, No. 151, pp. 256-263. 



